MARRIAGE, Christian. The word is derived through the French mari, from the Latin maritiis, " a husband." Malrimomj, a synonyme, comes from the Latin mater, " a mother," as testimonium from testis, " a witness." Wedlock, a beautiful word, is of Anglo-Saxon origin, from weddian, "to pledge," "to covenant;" or wedd, " a pledge," and lac, " a gift." The definition of marriage given by Modestinus, the Roman la^vyer and scholar of Ulpian, is as follows: "Nuptiai sunt conjunc- tio maris et femmaj et consortium omnis %-ita3, divini et humani juris communicatio" {Digest, x\iii, 2, 1). In the Institutes of Justinian we have " nuptiis sive matri- monium est viri et mulicris conjunctio individuam vitae consuetudinem continens," that is, aimion of a man and a woman which contains in itself an inseparable life- intercourse. These definitions are not entirely definite, nor free from objection ; nor is it easy for the law to give a definition of that which transcends the sphere of human rights, and has most important relations to mo- rality and religion.
According to Paley, the public use of the marriage institution consists in its promoting the ftjUowing bene- ficial effects : 1. The private comfort of individuals. 2. The production of the greatest number of healthy chil- dren, their better education, and the making of due provision for their settlement in life. 3. The peace of human societ}', in cutting off a principal source of con- tention, by assigning one or more women to one man, and protecting his exclusive right by sanctions of mo- rality and law. 4. The better government of society, by distributing the community into separate families, and appointing over each the authority of a master of a family, which has more actual influence than all civil authority put together. 5. The additional security wliich the state receives for the good behavior of its citizens, from the solicitude tliey feel for the welfare of their children, and from their being confined to perma- nent habitations. 6. Tlie encouragement of industry. (See also Dwight's Theology on this topic, and Anderson, On the Domestic Constitution.)
I. The idea of man-iage is beautifully expressed in those words of the earliest book of the Bible : " There- fore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto liis wife ; and they twain shall be one flesh." Here we have (1) marriage conceived of as a union so close that it separates a man from the union of the family — the closest but this one that can exist ; (2) two persons cleave to one another, the word cleare in the original denoting to be glued to, to stick to ; (3) the result is that they become one flesh, ihex unite their personalities together. A text like this points to monogamy as alone answering to the true conception of marriage; for how can two be one flesh, and one of them be also united to a third person, so as to be one flesh with that one also. Accordingly the union of one man and one woman in the married state, as opposed to polygamy, must be regardeil as the state pointed out by our nature for us. This alone preserves the miity, the undivided hjve and peace of the household. Polygamy is an institution growing out of the servile subjection of the woman to the man, and out of the indulgence of lewd desire. It is also apparently contrary" to the order of things in this, that the sexes, so obviously made for one another, divide between them about equally the numbers of those who are born into the world, there being a slight excess in the number of male chUdren,
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which is counterbalanced before manhood is reached by the greater risks incurred bj' that sex. The conditions which secure the interests of morality are thus pointed out by the laws of our physical nature.
The conception of marriage which appears in the writings of Paul has sometimes been said to be a low one, as having respect to the gratification of bodily de- sires rather than to the true, spiritual, and heart com- munion of the wedded pair. This charge is founded on such passages as 1 Cor. vii, 9 : "It is better to marry than to burn ;" and on those verses in the same chapter where there appears to be a certain preference in the apostle's mind of the single to the married life (ver. 33, 38, etc.). It must be confessed that if such a passage as ver. 9 ^^■cre the apostle's onlij expression of opinion, it would seem as if he saw nothing in marriage but the prevention of sexual excesses and the satisfaction of sexual longings. It ought, however, to be considered, first, that in such words he gives us but one side of a manifold subject. Christian, like all true moralists, must take into account the desires which are implanted in our nature for the purpose of securing certain gi'eat ends, among which the introduction of new beings into the world is most prominent. If, as men showed them- selves to the apostle, the sexual desires needed a cer- tain control, and a certain satisfaction also, it was good sense to say that a reason for marrying lay in the tem- perament of the particidar person, and that he was bound to consider his power of continence when he in- quired what his duty was in this respect. But, second- Ijl, the apostle gives us another picture of marriage, from another point of view. The relation (Ephes. v, 22-33) is like that of Christ to his Church. The hus- band is to love the wife as if she actually formed one body with him, and with that piu'e, self-sacrificing af- fection which Christ had when he "loved his Church, and gave himself for it." Here marriage is ennobled and glorified by a comparison with the most spiritual of all relations. But, thirdlij, neither in the writings of the apostle nor in any other part of the New Testa- ment is there any peculiar sanctity attached to the mar- ried life placing it above the single, nor to the single life making it more excellent than the married. The apostle condemns the false teachings of those who forbid men to marry, and command to abstain from meats, "which God has created to be received with thanks- giving" (1 Tim. iv, 3). His principle would include marriage — for which multitudes give thanks — under this last remark. At the same time the New Testament regards celibacy as equally honorable with marriage (Matt, xiv, 13). Nay more, if a person, for the king- dom of heaven's sake, can lead a life of pure thoughts, undisturbed by any sensual longings, absorbed in spirit- ual employments and pursuits, he may be said to have a rare nature, or a rare gift to rise above nature ; and so he will stand higlier in the kingdom of heaven than an- other, in proportion to the greatness of his self-sacrifice and his conse(?ration. All men are not boimd to " for- sake houses, or brethren, or sisters," etc., for Christ's name's sake, but those who have the call to do so and obey "shall receive a hundred-fold." So those who lead a single life under the same high motive shall have the greater praise from the Master ; and, as they show by their self-denial the strength of Christian virtue, they stand higher in the Christian scale than others. But so do they also who show a readiness to undergo, or actually undergo, any great sacrifice with the same spirit. (Comp. Harless, Chrisll. Ethik, § 44, and espe- cially § 52.)